


Remembering

by Palizinha



Series: Phinabella musings [3]
Category: Phineas and Ferb
Genre: F/M, Fluff, it's not canon compliant anymore whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 11:33:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28919886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Palizinha/pseuds/Palizinha
Summary: When Ferb bails out on Phineas and Isabella on their long-standing tradition to go to every school event together, they try to make the most of it. Though there is the slightly issue of their feelings for each other.Somewhat related to the previous stories in this series.
Relationships: Phineas Flynn/Isabella Garcia-Shapiro
Series: Phinabella musings [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2061606
Comments: 3
Kudos: 20





	Remembering

**Author's Note:**

> I am generally one to maintain canon compliance.
> 
> My idea was to do just that.
> 
> I did not maintain canon compliance.

Phineas was used to going to parties and events with Ferb and Isabella, all three of them.

As children, that had been the most logical option. Ferb was his brother and Isabella was his best friend, so it made sense that, by going with his two favorite people, he’d have a good time.

In the past two years though… while Phineas stood by thinking that, a part of Phineas’s reasoning for it changed, what with the new and unexpected (but maybe there all along) feelings that high school had brought. About Isabella.

See, it was never truly surprising to Phineas that he’d develop feelings for Isabella. They had been best friends their entire lives, and if there was someone Phineas could have seen himself with, it was always going to be her. But he didn’t really think about that growing up, it always felt like something for later.

And then it was ‘later’ and high school started, and… things changed. Rather, Phineas and Isabella’s relationship changed. They hung out less, for one. And Phineas got it, he did, Isabella was an overachiever and of course as she got older that would change from “getting all Fireside Girl patches” (which Phineas could help with) to “making the most of the high school experience”.

So, Phineas began to fear that one of Isabella’s high school experiences would involve getting actual dates to school events, because that was what teenagers did. So, Phineas made sure that out of all the things that changed, going to events with Ferb and Isabella didn’t.

For the most part, he had gotten his wish. Isabella sometimes looked like she wanted to say no when he asked if the three of them were going together, but she never did and always seemed happy when they went together. And Ferb was a great brother.

But Ferb was also a teenager, which led to…

“The winter party,” Ferb said, three days before the said party. “I can’t go with you.”

“Wait, wait?” Phineas looked up from his homework to look at him “You’re kidding, right? It’s a tradition for us and Isabella to go together, to everything.”

“We can still hang out a little during, but I have a date,” Ferb said, like Phineas didn’t have every single plan he had for the party shattered by that.

On other occasions, Phineas would be happy for Ferb, and he was, really, but...

“I can’t just go with Isabella,” Phineas said, feeling himself panic a little bit. “But we already agreed on going together, and I know I should have asked you if you wanted to invite someone else, but Isabella is going to feel like I tricked her to get a date. Which I didn’t do, despite my feelings for her.”

Ferb started at that, and Phineas caught up to his own mouth.

“I mean…” Phineas tried to think a way out of this.

Keeping his feelings for Isabella a secret from his friends had been easier than Phineas thought it would be, as they all seemed to somehow be under the impression Phineas didn’t know what dating meant (quite literally. Buford had gotten a date with a guy a few months before and tried to explain the concept to him).

“You have a crush on Isabella,” Ferb said, and for once Phineas couldn’t figure out what he was thinking. “Why does she not know that?”

“I can’t just…” Phineas tried to put it in words. “Isabella and I have been best friends pretty much since we were on our diapers. If I say I have feelings for her, and she inevitably doesn’t feel the same, things are going to be even weirder between us than they already are. Especially since, you know, things only started getting weird around the time I figured out I liked her.”

Ferb raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.

“I’ll let you figure this one out yourself,” Ferb finally spoke. “Have a nice time with Isabella on your date.”

Phineas just sat there as Ferb smiled to himself and left their bedroom.

On the bright side, Ferb wasn’t one for meddling. So it was very likely Isabella wouldn’t be hearing about this.

But there was still the issue of, you know, getting through the winter party with Isabella as his sole date. Without her figuring out his feelings for her.

Phineas had the impression he may be screwed.

* * *

Isabella was looking forward to the winter party.

Despite being around Phineas less now - partly so she’d get over him, but partly because she was just genuinely very busy - their relationship seemed to have reached a good point. They had fun together, and having Ferb there made the whole thing seem less like the dates she had once tried to score and more just having fun with her friends.

And despite anything else, Phineas was her best friend, and it was good to spend time with him without thinking of the romance goal. When Isabella was younger she had missed that point sometimes.

Which, of course, made what Phineas just told her a bit of an issue.

“Wait, just the two of us?” Isabella repeated. “What about Ferb?”

“He has a date, apparently,” Phineas said. “Didn’t tell me who with, but the only person in school he hangs out with outside of the gang is Kristin, so probably her.”

“Kristin?” Isabella said. “That makes sense, he talks more than usual about her compared to anyone else.”

“See, I thought that too!” Phineas said, making Isabella giggle. “Anyway, I just wanted to come over and see if that was alright with you if it was just the two of us. If you don’t want to, maybe you could get a date too. I can skip the party.”

Because of course Phineas would jump straight to not realizing that Isabella once had hoped her hardest that Ferb would bail on them (not that she didn’t adore Ferb).

“No, it’s.. It’s fine,” Isabella said, trying to stop herself from falling into old habits and getting too excited about time alone with Phineas. Or, well, as alone as a party all their friends would be in could be.

“See you there, then?” Phineas said with a grin, though Isabella could see something was eating him up.

“Is it alright with you?” Isabella had to ask. If Phineas didn’t want to go with just her and was only to do it because they had agreed to, he didn’t have to.

“Yeah!” Phineas said, and Isabella knew he wasn’t lying. But there definitely was something going on.

Phineas went back to his house and Isabella stood close to the door, looking through the window at him.

In other occasions, this would be the part where Isabella would put in what happened in the Fireside Girl group chat and they’d freak out about it. Baljeet would be coming to Danville through the portal Phineas and Ferb made for him specifically for the party and they had all freaked out about it with Ginger earlier.

But this party didn’t really change anything. Phineas wasn’t more interested in her now than he had been for the past thirteen years.

Isabella at this point just wanted to have a good time at a party with her best friend, and thinking of anything else wasn’t a good idea. Regardless of whether or not ‘getting over Phineas’ had turned out to be a lot harder than Isabella had thought it would be.

It would be fine. Really.

* * *

The day of the party, Phineas may have taken too long trying to figure out what to wear.

It had to say ‘we’re here as friends’ and ‘I’m not expecting anything else’. Which may be too much to expect out of an outfit.

Ferb, who had already been ready for like an hour by that point, seemed like he was losing his patience. Which said a lot, considering it was Ferb.

“So, now that you know I like Isabella,” Phineas said, trying on another pair of pants. “I can talk to you about it. Should I have talked to her first so we’d match colors? I don’t really have much purple, and that’s what she usually wears.”

Ferb didn’t even answer. He just stood up, walked to Phineas, and picked out an outfit for him in less than a minute.

And it seemed like the right choice.

“Wow, bro, have you ever thought of getting into fashion?” Phineas asked, and then thought about it. “You know, outside of that one time we did.”

“You are going to walk to Isabella’s house,” Ferb said slowly. “Tell her she looks beautiful even if she doesn’t, and then have a good time at the party.”

“Right…” Phineas said, trying to commit to doing just that. “She always looks beautiful, though.”

Ferb gave Phineas a look. “Then it will be easy.”

“Ok. Time to go,” Phineas said, and then didn’t move. Ferb waited a second and then pushed Phineas a little, which was the push (ha!) he needed. “I’m going now.”

Phineas felt lucky Isabella lived right across from them, as it wasn’t exactly a long walk.

When he knocked on the door, Isabella answered weirdly quickly, like it was even before he fully knocked, and they just looked at each other for a long moment.

“You look beautiful,” Phineas said, not even remembering Ferb had told him to say that.

“Yeah, you look nice too,” Isabella said.

Phineas grinned at her, all his fears about the party forgotten as soon as he actually saw her.

“This is going to be a good party,” Phineas said, as they walked to the school (that was thankfully close by).

“Did you and Ferb work on the decorations? I know the school asks sometimes,” Isabella said.

“Not this time,” Phineas said. “But that makes it more exciting, right? We have no idea what it looks like.”

“Definitely not as good as you and Ferb would have made it,” Isabella said, like it wasn’t even a question, and Phineas tried not to blush. Isabella just had so much trust in his abilities.

“I’m surprised you weren’t involved in the party. You’re in, like, everything,” Phineas said.

“I’m still just one,” Isabella said.

“We could make you into more if you’re too busy,” Phineas said.

“Right, and then a ray would fall from the sky and somehow hit all five versions of myself and I’d be just one again at a crucial moment in all five things I was doing. I love your inventions, Phineas, but they do have a tendency to disappear,” Isabella said.

“Rays don’t really fall from the sky anymore,” Phineas said. He couldn’t remember the last time it happened - before high school, even. He had a dream where he was hit by one right after Isabella said she liked him, sometimes.

“Oh, for me they would,” Isabella said, looking a bit weird as she said it.

“I’ll have you know we checked you, and your probability ions are within the normal. Your cuteness is still off the charts, of course,” Phineas said.

“Of course,” Isabella deadpanned.

“Now,” Phineas said when they got to the school. “As your date, it’s within my duties to make sure you have a good time. What do you want to do first?”

“It’ll be a good time if you’re here,” Isabella said.

Phineas’s thoughts stuttered a bit after that one.

“S-still, should we find our friends or do you want to dance a little first?”

Phineas was still trying to get his thoughts sorted before he said too much when he spotted Buford. “There we go, Buford’s here. Let’s go say hi to him.”

Phineas took Isabella’s hand without thinking about it and led her to Buford, who had taken his camera to the party, as he often did.

“Dinnerbell, did you finally figure things out?” Buford said as soon as he saw them, making Phineas realize he was still holding Isabella’s hand. He’d wait for her to let go.

“What do you mean?” Phineas asked.

“Of course you didn’t,” Buford said. “Where’s your usual third wheel?”

“Is Ferb not here yet?” Phineas looked around for him. “He’s been ready for an hour, but Ferb usually does that. Something about making the clothes seem a bit wrinkled, but not enough for them to look bad.”

“So you three didn’t come together?” Buford winked at Isabella, who Phineas saw roll her eyes. But she still hadn’t let go of his hand.

“He had a date,” Phineas said.

“Kristin?” Buford guessed.

“Probably.”

Buford said something about leaving the two of them alone and went to take pictures of the other students (according to Isabella, who worked on the yearbook, they very rarely actually used Buford’s pictures, he just liked taking them).

“Sooo…” Phineas said, grinning at Isabella. “Do you want to dance?”

* * *

Isabella thought Phineas was acting a bit weird.

Not only was he really making a show of being her date - what with the handholding and calling her beautiful - he also seemed weirdly… happy about it.

While she had been looking forward to spending time with Phineas, she had feared that not being with Ferb all night would make him a bit bored, as Isabella hadn’t spent time together alone with him in a very long time (partially on purpose), and she wasn’t sure they still would find things to talk about.

But they did. Talking to Phineas came as easily as ever, and the ‘date’ thing didn’t seem to be putting him off.

So, Isabella had made the decision to make the most of it, even if she had accepted at this point that not only was Phineas never going to figure out she liked him, if she ever tried to tell him he’d promptly forget about it afterwards.

They danced for a bit and then went to rest, a bit far from their friends.

“Tonight has been fun,” Isabella said.

“There are some issues with the lighting,” Phineas said. “But they didn’t do a bad job putting everything together. It looks beautiful.”

“Well, if the expert says so…” Isabella teased.

“You’re brilliant at this stuff too,” Phineas said simply. “I remember who put everything together back during our big projects.”

“I wasn’t really fishing for a compliment,” Isabella said, blushing a little.

“Well, you deserved one anyway,” Phineas said. The thing about Phineas was that he was rarely not happy, but there was a happiness shining in his eyes that somehow took Isabella’s breath away.

This was the longest they had spent alone together in a very long time, and it felt like every single fear Isabella had ever had about doing that was unfounded.

Sure, Phineas still didn’t have feelings for her, but being around him didn’t make the pain of an unrequited crush worse. It was worse when they weren’t together.

“I was a bit scared of tonight,” Phineas said, honestly, and Isabella looked at him. She had never seen him look at her like that before. “Because… we haven’t been that close anymore, recently, and I was afraid that was my fault.”

“Phineas, you didn’t do anything wrong,” Isabella said, without a moment’s thought. When she had decided she needed some time away from Phineas to get over him, she hadn’t considered whether he would think it was his fault.

“And the thing is…” Phineas started saying, and then hesitated.

* * *

The thing was… Phineas had been really scared. It didn’t seem like a coincidence that he and Isabella started drifting apart around the same time he realized he had feelings for her. And while he thought the drifting had happened first - he was pretty sure it was realizing that that made him notice he had a crush on her - he wasn’t actually certain of that.

But he didn’t say anything, because if Isabella had noticed it and was trying to let him down gently, she didn’t need him actually telling her how he felt, or it would get worse.

But going to that party with Isabella made him realize that… maybe that wasn’t what happened. Maybe they just grew apart.

And if that was the case, he was tired of being apart from his best friend. If they grew apart, he wanted to fix it.

And he didn’t think that could happen if…

“I don’t want to have any secrets between us,” Phineas said. “I’ve always thought you were the most amazing person I knew.”

“You’re awesome too, Phineas,” Isabella said, but Phineas knew she was aware he was going somewhere with this.

“Growing up, being around you was one of the things that could make a day the best. And… it’s not quite the greatest day ever if I can’t share a smile with you,” Phineas had never truly wondered what it would be like if he told Isabella about his feelings for her, because Isabella was just so awesome, and they had been friends for such a long time he didn’t want to throw it away by making his feelings her problem. “So, I thought… you should probably know that you are a huge part of what makes my day great. There have been so many times where I was having a bad day, and seeing you was enough to turn it around.”

“Phineas…” Isabella started, but seemed to think about it and stopped.

“Gosh, I don’t quite know how to say this. I just… I want you in my life, in any way, but I’d especially like it if we were together,” That wasn’t quite how Phineas wanted to put it, but Isabella seemed to get the message, despite his pretty messy speech.

Isabella just looked at him for a moment, and then looked around them for another.

Phineas was willing to give her time to process what he said, but the silence was starting to make him panic a little bit.

“Or we can just… we can just forget about all this!” Phineas said, wanting Isabella to just say something, even if it wasn’t what he wanted to hear.

“Let’s…” Isabella finally looked back at him. “Let’s not forget any of tonight.”

Phineas smiled at Isabella, trying to figure out what she meant by that, when she moved forward and hugged him.

“My days aren’t the same without you, either,” Isabella said, and Phineas felt her tighten her grip on him as he moved to hug her back. “So, let’s remember instead. Together.”

Phineas still wasn’t quite sure what she meant by that, but he was sure she would explain it to him in time.

He was just happy this meant he wouldn’t lose her.

And just having this was better than any dream he ever had.

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally a completely different story that had nothing to do with the previous two I wrote, but like. When you have something you might as well use it, and that felt like a good way to end it.


End file.
